Converting Miles -- Any advice?
 

Hi everyone, new to the site, but love it already. Hopefully one of you seasoned travelers will have an answer for me. Here's my scenario -- I have about 19,000 USAir Dividend miles and about 50,000 Skymiles. Is there a program out there that will allow me to convert those USAir miles to Delta skymiles? I checked Points.com, but it looks like they don't convert USAir to Delta. ANY help would be appreciated. Thanks.

Welcome to FT!

There is no 1:1 conversion between the two. That being said, let's get to the question behind the question, and perhaps we can work outside of the box.

Are you looking for a DL award that requires 80,000 miles? Are you looking for 2 DL awards?

Keep in mind that soon (unlesss I am mistaken) you will be able to use US miles for UA flights. You can also use DL miles for domestic UA free tickets. So some combination without conversion might work here.

Hi and welcome.
Yes, you cannot really 'combine' two frequent flier programs (FFP's) without losing a lot in the transalation in most cases.

You can soon see what may be doable with partners like United as said above but I think USAIR/UAL code shares are not yet fully in place so we have to wait on that one.

If, however, we are to assume that you are trying to "consolodate," meaning you are trying to make it so you have less programs to deal with and use only one airline FFP, then you may wish to do something like this:

For USAIR, you could do some things to 'shore up' that 19k and get a free RT ticket out of it, and then be done with them if you wish. Then you can concentrate on the DL account, which seems to be the main carrier for you.

In here you will learn tons of things but for starters, if this is indeed part of your possible plan, try using IDINE to get the extra miles needed to get a free ticket on USAIR and I think these awards are still only 20k.

Idine lets you asign any credit card or debit card (miles-earning or not) to its free service and then when you go eat in many of the listed restuarants and bars in its program, you get 10 miles per dollar spent. Go spend $100 with friends at dinner and you'll have 1000 miles. Now you'll have 20k on USAIR, you'd take a free trip and then work the Delta account in similar ways, and then some.

Good luck!


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If speed is not your thing, distance may as well be. Enjoy and embrace it all!

The 20K free ticket awards on USAirways are "off-peak" only. Check their web site for the exact dates.

US doesn't participate in the Hilton HHonors Reward exchange, so no possibility of transferring points out that way.

That's what I'm doing. Once I vanquish the US account, probably by flying UA, I'll credit the rare future US flight to UA.

This is based on Hilton HHonors transferability, which I try to maximize whenever possible on my non frequent airlines.

To ensure maximum points from flying (and minimum orphan miles!) I've matched up certain airlines with partners. Here is how it looks:

Fly.....Earn
UA......UA, DL [DL likely to end on UA]
US......UA
DL......DL, UA
AA......AA (only airline that does 1:1 ratio http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/frown.gif -- all others do 1:2)
CO......CO [DL if partnership gets approved]
NW......CO [DL if partnership gets approved]
AS......CO, HA (AA, but again, only 1:1)
HA......HA
HP......HA
YX......YX
F9......YX

AS = Alaska
HA = Hawaiian
HP = America West
YX = Midwest
F9 = Frontier

I try to plan out at the beginning of each trip which will be best, taking into account online booking bonuses, rental partners, and current balances.

[This message has been edited by Rut Dog (edited 11-22-2002).]

I suspect that, in all likelihood, the DL/UA FF agreement will die as soon as US and UA are fully integrated. Therefore, there is likely to be little time during which you could "combine" DL and US miles by redeeming them both for UA tickets. So, you will need to keep a very close watch on that, to see if there is a small window of opportunity there, before it evaporates.

Djlawman

Just curious what airlines can convert over to hilton honors and what is the minimum one can transfer over. Appreciate your help.

Continental, Delta, Unted, American Aero California, Hawaiian, LanChile, LatinPass, Mexicana Airlines, Midwest Espress, Sourth African, Virgin Atlantic. All are 5000 miles to 10,000 HH points except American which 5K to 5K, and Lan Child which is 10,000 kilometers to 10K points, Virgin which is 5K to 5K and has 10K minimum. All others can be exchanged with 5K minimum.

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Ms.DtG

Click here for more information at the HHonor site.
Click here to get to the Hilton forum.

[This message has been edited by ql2112 (edited 11-23-2002).]